Each Friday, CM Designers (most often it's the insanely talented Tara Dickinson!) offers a little set of FREE images for you to use on your digital scrapbooking projects you create in Storybook 4! Today's freebies happen to be a set of Medieval Times themed images, but you can scroll down through the blog to see hundreds more sets and choose the ones you like!

These College images are from last week...

...and these Back to School images are from earlier in August...

I also like to go hybrid and use some of these digital images on my regular paper scrapbooking pages. There are so many images that you are bound to find something to complement your scrapbook page, and you can re-size and recolor to match your project perfectly. Print them out onto white cardstock, trim around the image and you have an inexpensive custom embellishment!

Not sure how to import the freebies? Click here for a short video tutorial that will walk you through the steps of creating a folder in which to download and save your imported freebies!

This Friday, spend some time viewing the Friday Freebies and plan some projects - digital or hybrid! - for the weekend!

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

As always, we'll be making two 12 x 12 layouts and two cards using the Additions pack and the extra items I include in your kit! Here's a peek at the two layouts we'll make so you can identify the photos you might want to use:

As you can see, you'll need about five 4 x 6 photos (some will be trimmed down) to complete the layouts, but we can always adapt your layout to add more, or use less!

Kits are still only $15.00 and will include the Reminisce Additions Pack (which had four sheets of paper and two sticker sheets), along with extra cardstock, die-cuts, cards & envelopes and a step-by-step instruction sheet to make everything you see here.

The next KOTM workshop will be held from 7:30 - 9:30 pm at my home in NW Calgary next Friday September 21st. Book your workshop spot now and I will have your kit ready for you to put together...all you need to bring is your photos and some adhesive!

If you are not in Calgary, or can't make it to the workshop, you can still purchase the kit and complete it at home at your convenience! You must contact me to purchase though, as the kit is NOT available on my CM website! Just drop me an email and we'll make arrangements to get it to you!

Sunday, September 09, 2012

Over the past couple of weeks we have been busy getting organized to go back to school. I found that I had less time to scrapbook, but I still did a few crafty and organizational projects and used a lot of my scrapbooking supplies in other ways. Here are 5 ways I used them in the last two weeks.

1) Closet Dividers - To ease the pain of deciding what clothes the boys will wear each day, I decided to make some tabs to organize their school clothes each week. On Sunday nights we'll pick out 5 outfits for the week, hang them up and use the circles to identify and divide them up. I used my Circle Patterns and Creative Memories Custom Cutting System to cut out five circles that would fit over the boys closet rods and simply wrote the days of the week on each one. I used cardstock for these ones, but chipboard or sheets of craft foam would work well too.

3) Pencil Holder - I needed a holder for pens and pencils to go in a little wooden box that also holds paper scraps for phone messages in our kitchen command center, so I used a piece of patterned scrapbook paper that coordinated with my kitchen colors to cover an empty soup can! The can was the perfect size so I prettied it up with the paper. (I used to re-purpose this kind of stuff all the time...when did I stop? So easy...and cheap!)

4) To-Do and To-Buy Clipboards - I needed a more permanent place where I could keep an ongoing list of my scrapbook pages and projects, as well as a smaller list for supplies I need to replenish or purchase for a project. I dug out some bare clipboards I bought at the dollar store awhile back, glued some pretty pink scraps of paper down using white glue mixed with water (I don't buy Mod-Podge as this works just as well!) and then added some coordinating ribbons to finish them off. I plan on hanging the clipboards to the sides of my desk drawers under my scrap table for easy access, and I'll always know where my lists are!

5) Lunchbox notes - Since we live so close to the school, Grayson only takes his lunch occasionally. When he does, I like to tuck a little note - a joke or "love note" - into his lunchbag to remind him how much I love him, miss him and that I am thinking of him while he is at school. I often use my Creative Memories Tag Maker for notes like this, or dip into my collection of journal boxes - these ones are from the Cheerful Power Palette. A small punched shape or sticker is the perfect accent. (Bonus...Melissa from of my favorite Mom Blogs, "320 Sycamore", posted a downloadable list of 180 Lunchbox jokes! That's one for every day of the school year! Hmmm...maybe Grayson will have to take his lunch more often!)

This week, I hope you get inspired by something from your stash...find a piece of paper you love and cover a notebook, a frame or a can. Make a card for a friend. Whip up a bunch of those lunch notes. Make something pretty and practical for your desk. Let your supplies do double-duty for you!

Tuesday, September 04, 2012

It's hard to believe the summer is almost over! Like every other family in Calgary, we were busy doing back-to-school shopping and organizing this weekend, but we also made time to create some gifts for the boys' new teachers. As a teacher, it's always a nice surprise to receive a gift - no matter how big or small or at what time of year, so we thought we would put together a little "Welcome Back" pack!

Grayson did not find out who his teacher was until he arrived at school this morning, and although Sam will have the same speech and occupational therapists, he will have a variety of new classroom assistants. So since we didn't know all the teachers, I thought the gift packs should be a fairly generic with things that anyone working in a school setting could use. Here's what we came up with...

Grayson helped me package them all up in simple cellophane bags. We punched some tags from the Enchanted Journaling Boxes with my Tag Maker to add "Welcome Back to School" tags! I saw lots of poems for Teacher Survival Kits online, but I really just wanted these to be low-key little goodies for them to USE instead of cutsie things like an elastic to "stay flexible" or a pin to "stay sharp". For a busy teacher those kind of gifts, while thoughtful and cute, are really not that useful!

Here's the cost breakdown:

Mini-Composition books - .33 each (3/$1.00 at Dollar Store)

Pen - .85 each (12/$10.16 at Staples. Yeah, I could have got less expensive pens at the Dollar Store, but I like these ones so I can open them up and slip in the matching papers! They are Pentel RSVP brand)

Pencil - .20 each (5/$1.00 at Dollar Store)

Post-it Notes - .33 each (3/$1.00 at Dollar Store)

Tissues - .13 each (8/$1.00 at Dollar Store)

Moist Wipes - .13 for two (24/$1.00 at Dollar Store)

Hard Candy/Chocolate - .50 each portion (I bought 4 bags at $1.00 each at the Dollar Store and divvied them up and still have a little left), and I had the mini smarties in my snack cupboard!

Cellophane Bags - I ALWAYS have these in my wrapping drawer, but I think you can get 24 or 30 in a package for $1.00 - $2.00, so it's a minimal cost!

So for about $2.75 each, the boys can give a little token to each teacher to help get the school year off to a happy start! If you only have one or two teachers to make for, then you can certainly add a few more items but since I had to make 8 bags, I kept the contents - and cost - down. This idea is so adaptable and easy to put together for any occasion.

Here are the easy instructions to alter the composition books themselves (really, it's so easy you don't even need instructions...so just consider these to be "tips!)

Choose a lightweight decorative paper instead of a cardstock weight and trim down to a size just slightly larger than the cover of the book. The photo matts in the Enchanted Storybox set were a perfect weight.

Since the black edging is slightly raised from the cardboard covers, it provides a perfect edge to line up your papers on for a nice clean look. Adhere the paper to the book with mod-podge or white glue and be sure to coat the entire surface, right to the edges, then smooth the paper down.

Repeat on the back.

It helps to weight them down with a heavy object while they are drying so the cardboard covers don't warp.

Once the paper is dry, add flat or dimensional embellishments, or stamps if you are a stamper! That's it - see, told you it was easy!

About Me

Hi! I'm a wife and mom of two busy boys. I'm am art teacher by day and a crafty homebody by night. I love being at home or at our little cabin in the woods, organizing, crafting, cooking or baking and trying to make the crazy job of being a mom a little more creative and fun. Join me for my adventures in family life!